Sneaky little Skavenses (FoPVP)

Hello to you all! Today we've got another in our very occasional series called "Friends of PVP". This time it is the Skaven of Mark Sarton (Assistant Kogz over on the Beard Bunker). For those who are less aware of them, the Skaven are man-sized rat men with a meglomaniacal personality somewhere between Blofeld and Hitler.

The core of Mark's Skaven is very much the humble clanrat. He's a big believer in Skaven being the horde...

Yup, really hordes! This one is about 70 strong and normally has a warboss in it! Ouch.

The skavenslaves units include enslaved humans, goblins and orcs, its one of my favourite features of the army. The slaves of the Skaven should be all races! None can stand before the rodent master race!

Backing up all the Clanrats are some of the weapon teams that the Skaven are rightly feared for.

These Forgeworld wolf rats are an evil addition, lightning fast and durable enough to handle a unit twice their size they have acquired a justified level of apprehension in the Beard Bunker campaign.

The resin holds some lovely details including the brands on the hind quarters.

This is Voltik, the leader of the army and mad inventor providing the master plan. He's based on the Ikkit Claw model and uses his rules.

Skivvit Backbreaker provides some serious muscle and along with the massive static combat resolution that the horde provides is a tough customer to take out!

Then there is the first Warlock Engineer, called... Lucky Sh*twhiskers. Yup, Sh*twhiskers. Somehow it totally fits and has become my favourite character in Mark's army. He is kinda hapless and succeeds in spite of himself!

Slightly more destructive is Blevvy, he's another Warplock Engineer. Equipped with a doom rocket and capable of Skitterleaping into the ideal position to use it he can carve a massive hole in the opponant's lines.

Look out for more of Mark's Skaven on the Beard Bunker, until next time.

TTFN

Announcing the Beard Bunker!

I have frequently posted lovely images of models created by friends of mine. Search FoPVP if you've not seen them. Go on, I can wait.... nice huh? Well, after some inspiring and cajoling the members of the House of Beard have started their very own conduit of hobby craziness in the form of the Beard Bunker Blog, obey the penguin below! Click the link!

Awesome badge from Zazzle.co.uk

Thus while Pirate Viking Painting will always be my home I now also contribute to the Beard Bunker so I urge everyone to check it out and support it while they all find their blogging legs. I guarantee fascinating stuff*.

TTFN

*Warning, your fascination levels may vary from those experianced by Jeff...

Oh the humanity! (FoPVP)

To tide you over 'till the new year I am throwing open the archives of Friends of Pirate Viking Painting. This time we are taking a look at the human residents of the 41st millenium rather than the post-human Astartes.

First for consideration is this Colonel "Iron Hand" Straken, painted by Jen Truby. The red has been well used on this figure, most of the colour scheme is fairly cool and the warm red flows nicely down the figure. The polished metalwork also looks lovely against his aging flesh.

In the same style is this Gunnery Sergeant Harker, also by Jen. I much prefer this scheme to the official studio scheme which is horribly garish.

Fighting for the opposition is this Forgeworld Chaos Renegade Psyker, frankly, he is not having a good day. The subtle urban basing works really well on this figure.

Moving on to Maisey's Imperial Guard, this Lord Commissar is one of those models that is a lot of fun to work with. The clean white works so well against the deep, almost plummy red. The little freehand aquillas lift the cloak to a more sumptous look in keeping with such a high ranking Imperial servant.

Likewise, his Officer of the Fleet spotter reeks of privilage and rank. The deep blue works well with the clean white and I love the shiny glossed boots!

Finally, we take a look at one of my favourite Imperial Guard figures. This commissar, inspiring Maisey's Redshirts Regiment, is a lovely understated job. The military colouring gives it such a different feel to the traditional black and red.

Thats all folks, see you in the new year.

TTFN

Space Marine Smörgåsbord (FoPVP)

Presenting for your delification and delight a selection of Space Marines all painted by the House of Beard.

First for consideration is this marvelous Njal Stormcaller by Jen Truby. There are very few ways that I can enrich this with words so just gaze and enjoy!

I rarely have the guts to go that high contrast on furs but I might have to. Looks great.

Its hard for me to decide which I like best, the Marine face or the wolf. The extra mile edge highlighting on the staff really makes those runes pop too.

Next is a Space Hulk terminator by Maisey. He really went the distance on creating contast between the areas of detail and painted a nice deep red that I clearly approve of!

Sticking with Maisey's work we'll take a look at some of his White Hand Space Marines

They are a nice simple, striking colour scheme and the weathering helps to break up the black nicely.

The chaplains of the White Hand are a direct reversal of their normal colour scheme to help them stand out against their black liveried bretheren.

Finishing off our Space Marine Smorgasbord we have a selection of Charlie's Templars Viridian. The first unit is this scout squad. Both Charlie and I rather dislike the odd sculpting of the scout faces. The Wayne Rooney chin is frankly ugly. We came up (independantly but it turns out at the same time) the idea of using Elysian Drop Troop heads to replace the ugly Rooney heads.

The Captain is an example of how a nice base can make an understated officer colour scheme stand out from the crowd. Often, over baroque commanders can stand out from their armies a little too much. This model shows a nice integrated officer that is unmistakable nonetheless. Sure, some people will be making comments about tournament rules or game effects or some such. Not me, put it this way, the words "but that will affect tournament play" have never, ever crossed my mind.

 

And to finish off, a unit of Sternguard veterans. Lots of modifications, bionics and battle damage. Welp, all for this update! More soon as I am finishing another unit of goblins and the Blood Knights.

TTFN

Comes the Inquisitor (FoPVP)

While painting progresses on a few super-secret christmas commissions, I've decided to share some more of the House of Beard's excellent output with you. For those who are unaware, the House of Beard is a loose conglomeration of like minded gamers including yours truly who operate out of a deeply geek themed house in Oxford. Today it is the turn of some of their Inquisition models:

The group above is the warband of Inquisitor Aerdon - the leader and GM character of the loooong running Inquisitor game at the House of Beard. Whilst the retinue models are nice and all I think we'll have a closer look at Aerdon himself first:

This is - in my opinion - one of the best models GW ever made and for some reason was a limited edition. Boggles the mind (incidently, if anyone has one and doesn't want it then I will gladly give it a good home and a loving paint job!). Charlie's simple but striking scheme lets the model do the talking without the need for screeds of freehand work. I know I keep harping on about this but look at the colour balance on the model. The green bandanna balances the green tunic and the bronze sections form diagonals across the model by using consistant metal sot colours. The neutral coat allows the green and bronze to stand out.

Backing up the Inquisitor are these Vostroyan Storm Troopers. Gotta love the archaic lasguns and the mad impractical bearskin shakos. Very 40k.

In case more backup is required then we have a Templars Viridian Space Marine seconded to Inquisitional service. Those readers familiar with the 54mm Inquisitor miniature range may find this fellow familiar. There's a reason for that:

He is a small version of his larger brother! This isn't me mucking about with scale, the marine at the back really is that huge. The 54mm scale Brother Artemis is a nice challenge if anyone ever fancies pushing their painting and is a lovely display piece.

To finish off today we have a shot of our 54mm scale marine under his helmet. The model has been assembled with long pins in the neck socket allowing them to change out the head for the helmet when needed.

Well, that's all folks, hope you are all having a pleasant December, until next time.

TTFN

Warhammer Painting (FoPVP)

After posting the giant in the previous post I figured it would be only fair to include images of some of the armies that I have plundered banners from for his trousers...

This fellow is a Wissenland Captain painted by Maisey of the House of Beard, note how the red ties around the legs balance the swathe of red from the plume. An excellent use of spot colours, I might have repeated the process by painting the ribbon by the plume grey to pull the colour the other way but it still looks cool!

And from the loincloth (oh, and Maisey's paintbrush) is this horde of Bretonnian billmen, the striking mustard yellow and black works really well in a unit of this size with such prominant shields.

While we are looking at Maisey's Bretonnians, check out this sorceress, the rich blue against the pure white works really nicely with the aubern hair.

Moving around the giant to the - ahem - posterior we find a representation of Jen's Skaven force, Jen describes her army as a "banner delivery system" where the intricate banners distract from the batch painted unit. That having been said this is Jen's batch painting so they are still lovely!

We've seen it before but this banner of Charlie's army finishes the tributes/trophies/trousers. I strongly urge anyone who has regular opponants to include trophies from their armies. It binds the two together thematically and creates more of a story to the battles. Once while I was working at GW Peterborough, Alun (my collegue at the time) and I painted a whole Warmaster undead army in yellow and purple (the colours of our boss's Empire army) just to mess with him. Worth it! Until next time

TTFN

Empire feature (FoPVP)

Greetings all, as I am currently on holiday I thought I would treat you all to another instalment from the files of Friends of Pirate Viking Painting. This time it is the turn of a beautiful Empire army from the talented brush of Charlie Brassley.

Charlie's army is a sort of coalition force of various provinces, these Halbardiers are from Salzenmund and are called the "Chancers" hence the predominance of gambling images on their banner and their champion's shield.

One of the things that characterises Charlies painting is the lovely banners and freehand details that cover his armies. This is largely because Charlie is a "real" artist at the same time as being a figure painter so brings that skill at 2D painting to our 3D world.

The chap above is Salzenmund's Captain Rainer to give a closer look at the colour scheme.

These Greatswords are from the Middenland contingent and have the city of the white wolf emblazened on their banner. The converted Vostroyan standard bearer is the army standard.

Again from Middenland these knights are followers of Myrmidia and bear her image proudly upon their banner. The unit also contains the army general whose handsome visage is shown in the next two images:

Charlie's army includes some wonderful character work, amongst the best of which (in my opinion) are his wizards:

The object source lighting against the dark Arabian skin is just wonderful. Charlie has a whole storyline for this army about crusading in Araby and returning with a few friends like the astronomer shown above. Notice how he kept the staff very muted so as not to draw attention from the central feature.

For a more "home-grown" wizard, this Light magister is another chance to enjoy Charlie's freehand work. I can tell you from experiance that Charlie spends a great deal of time on each of these projects but the effort is clearly worth it.

Finally we have a warrior priest to round out this feature. Note the lovely scroll work and the simple yet effective additional freehand decoration on the shield itself. That is all from this episode of Friends of Pirate Viking Painting. I'm back from holiday on wednesday and normal service will resume. Until then, I leave you with the sunset from the top of the Great Orme in Llandudno.

TTFN